I’m not social scientist (though I like to think I play one in my job), but I wonder if there are any studies that show the natural evolution of socialization. And, if that natural evoluation of socialization actually builds up walls rather than bringing the larger community together.

Let me explain more of what I think could happen regarding online social networking….

Through blogs, discussion boards, social networks, communities and even virtual worlds, we have opportunities to “meet” and “know” more people than we can via face to face networking.

Through my own professional interest, I have way more than 50 blogs in my Bloglines account. Sure, I have other categories for my other, usually personal interests, but none that compare in quantity.

Sure, for various work projects and other activities related to work, I explore other topics and niche blogs and communities in social media. But, while they are interesting and I love to learn, if it wasn’t for work, I doubt if I’d explore too many or any of those other topics.

Is the norm to stick to our own interests as we grow our social networks, or is it the norm to go outside of our comfort and knowledge zones?

Without social media technology, our networks are face to face, and their size largely depends on if we tend to be introverts or extroverts.

Then, social media opens new opportunities. But do we still tend to aggregate to circles that are comfortable — despite the great opportunity to expand our horizons, given our limited time between life, family, work, community, etc.?

If we stick within and expand our given comfort level due to the opportunities afforded by social media, will that ultimately decrease the opportunity to really develop and become part of larger communities? Will we simply have larger cliques? Larger cliques, of course, that take up our already busy schedules and cut us off from expanding our real, social horizons to grow?

Another angle: I’ve been tossing around this post in my head for some weeks now. In the meantime, Shawn Sieg — a friend I knew before we added each other via Facebook — sent me an interesting link asking if social networking is making us anti-social. That’s another view of social networks — are your friends really friends, or is it some ego contest to see who has the most?

– Mike